Chicken Scratch Chutes

Yesterday was my final day doing inventory and clean-up work in the rental shop. Mike headed home to Massachusetts last week and Dana departed on her drive home to Vermont this morning. I'm in search of a new job and am the only person left in the apartment. I have a lot of time on my hands. I never think I like work while I'm doing it, but now that I don't have a job, I'm realizing how much I actually like working.

Today a crew of us did a ski in Teton Pass. It had been dumping snow all night and most of yesterday. There was talk of 12-16 inches of new snow in the pass. There were six of us total.

We hiked Glory and skied down the Chicken Scratch Chutes where we divided up into two groups of three to keep it safe. I was with Brandon and Phil. Neil, Adam, and Hank were in the second group. Each group took a different chute.

With the wet, heavy snow, we knew to be cautious and were expecting a good amount of slough. Neil had planned his line knowing how to avoid his slough, but ended up releasing a good sized slide. He didn't have any choice, but to ride it out. Neil was fine. We regrouped at the bottom and as we traversed out and around the corner, we realized that Neil's slide continued around. It was pretty big.

Yet again, I only brought my point-and-shoot so the quality isn't great...but here are some photos from the day.

[ Neil - safe and sound ]

[ Brandon checking out the debris pile...the debris split up and the other part continued probably a good 100 yards to the left ]

[ The three snowboarders on the traverse out ]

[ Neil and Brandon ]

[ Looking back ]

[ Final decent to the pass road ]

[ Making out way back to the parking lot ]